New Avatar Clip with Flying Peacock Lizards

For months now, the world has been inundated with how “ground breaking” and “revolutionary” James Cameron’s return to the big screen is going to be with Avatar. With giant budgets, giant egos and enough CGI to make George Lucas say “That’s too much,”Avataris being praised by critics and bloggers alike (which is kind of freaky that they actually agree on something) for actually living up to the super-ultra hype that has surrounded the film.

There are only a handful of people that have actually seen Avatar in its entirety so a true public opinion is still a day away. For those of us not lucky enough to be on the right list of who’s who, we have only the numerous promo clips, trailers and commercials to base our opinions on.

I’m so torn on this film; the sci-fi, fantasy, action geek inside of me is screaming “GET TICKETS NOW AND WATCH IT AT MIDNIGHT!”; while the skeptic in me is saying “This just doesn’t look to be all it’s cracked up to be.” Up until the last trailer for Avatar, I still wasn’t sold on it being the sliced bread of movies. This one featurette really sold me over, however, and I was looking forward to Avatar again.

Now we have this exclusive clip from MTV Movies Blog that shows Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) in his avatar form, riding a giant peacock lizard thing with Ney’tiri (Zoe Saldana). As they soar above the clouds of Pandora, enjoying life, they are suddenly attacked by a bigger more ferocious giant peacock lizard thing and have to outrun it in the forest. Enjoy the clip below:

Here is where I become torn again. Avatar will most likely look absolutely crap-my-pants fantastic on an IMAX screen in 3D, but on my laptop screen with my Bose headphones, it just doesn’t ruffle my skirt. I feel like I’m watching a big CGI cartoon episode on Nickelodeon. I’ll get some Avatar lovers throwing some hate at me for that last comment, but that’s how I feel. Avatar is being sold as a true “theater experience” type of film, but all of these low-resolution video clips are not helping push that agenda. If anything, they are hurting the film by pushing viewers off the fence and away from seeing it.

One thing I’m curious about, that sort of correlates to a theater experience film like Avatar: how will this hurt its “re-watchability” factor? The way a movie stays alive after its theater run is via Blu-ray, DVD, VHS, Digital Copies and so forth. If I watch a movie that I really enjoy and want to watch it again outside of the theater, then Blu-ray and DVD are my only options. If the only way to truly enjoy Avatar is to watch it on a 30-foot screen with a 10,000 watt sound system, then why would I want to purchase a home version?

Will this keep me from plunking down my money and watching and even enjoying Avatar in theaters? No probably not; I’ll be there tomorrow with my popcorn in hand ready to be blown away.

What are your thoughts on the latest clip and how do you think Avatar will translate from the big screen to the small screen?

I’m in Australia and caught it on Wednesday night. It wasn’t an IMAX screen, but it was 3D.

My opinion: It is truly epic. And it does have qualities that associate it with a full scale theatre experience. Will this hurt retail disc sales? No. I think it’ll be the opposite. A lot of people will see this on the big screen, and most of them will enjoy it. You can never re-experience seeing a movie for the first time, so people will be buying it on disc not only for the film itself, but also as an aid to remember the experience of seeing it initially. It’s similar to ‘The Matrix’ in that respect, and look at DVD sales of that.

And that’s not to say that it only work on the big screen. The story is surprisingly solid (with a positive message), and the characters are quite deep.

I really enjoyed it at the cinema, and I will be buying it on disc. I think a lot of people will be in the same boat.

WOW. that clip does the movie no justice. You HAVE to see it in 3d on the big screen. Its almost like its too perfect for a small video and you need the large screen to see the pores on their skin and sweat. Freaking amazing movie.